Boars, Gore, and Swords is hosted by stand-up comedians Ivan Hernandez and Red Scott. In each episode they break down HBO's Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. They also talk about movies, TV, science fiction, fantasy, and lots of other things. NSFW.

Ivan and Red begin the episode by discussing a recent behind-the-scenes Game of Thrones mini-doc from HBO and the questions it raises, before moving on to how to approach an introvert, Kristian Nairn, Detective Sheldon Cooper, Dead Like Me, Mikkelsen’s physicality, and cork boards with yarn.

And after finishing the discussion A Storm of Swords and The Princess and The Queen, Ivan and Red bring to your attention the next installment in their “What You Should Be Watching” series. They discuss one of the very few shows on television that can match George R.R. Martin’s disregard for his character’s lives, NBC’s Hannibal. Created by king of cancelled shows Bryan Fuller (of Dead Like Me, Pushing Daisies, Wonderfall, and writer on season 1 of Heroes), this show has a quantity of gore that relocates the boundaries of what’s acceptable on network television. The knockout cast includes Lawrence Fishburne, Mads Mikkelsen, and and a very strange turn for Scott Thompson, formerly of Kids in the Hall.
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Boars, Gore, and Swords is hosted by stand-up comedians Ivan Hernandez and Red Scott. In each episode they break down HBO's Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. They also talk about movies, TV, science fiction, fantasy, and lots of other things. NSFW.

Ivan and Red reach their fourth and final podcast of George R.R. Martin’s medium-to-normal length story in the “A Song of Ice and Fire” world, “The Princess and The Queen”, part of the Railroad curated Dangerous Women Anthology. They discuss Railroad’s irresponsible editor, the eight hour long movie that is True Detective, heads up hallucinations, flesh sloughing, your dragon vs. your child, the riderless horse, Ser Hobert Hightower as hardcore Wallace Shawn, and one last dragon battle.
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Boars, Gore, and Swords is hosted by stand-up comedians Ivan Hernandez and Red Scott. In each episode they break down HBO's Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. They also talk about movies, TV, science fiction, fantasy, and lots of other things. NSFW.

Ivan and Red continue into their penultimate installment of George R.R. Martin’s medium-to-normal length story in the “A Song of Ice and Fire” world, “The Princess and The Queen”, part of the Railroad curated Dangerous Women Anthology. We discuss our hopes for the future of True Detective, the significance of working out sibling rivalry through dragon violence, the 9,000 MySpace Bannerman, land pirates, the importance of not being Hobert, and mid-air dragon leaps.

This episode is brought to you by Squarespace, the all-in-one platform that makes it fast and easy to create your own professional website or online portfolio. For a free trial and 10% off, go to squarespace.com and use offer code BOARS.
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Boars, Gore, and Swords is hosted by stand-up comedians Ivan Hernandez and Red Scott. In each episode they break down HBO's Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. They also talk about movies, TV, science fiction, fantasy, and lots of other things. NSFW.

Midway through “The Princess and The Queen”, Ivan and Red take a break to cover… a web series? With direction by David Fincher, and starring Robin Wright, Kevin Spacey, and Kate Mara, House of Cards is easily the best web series of all time, certainly the one with the highest budget. They cover the reasons Game of Thrones fans would like House of Cards, dog problems, Presidential canon in fictional political shows, those three words every woman wants to here, heirlooms, and absolute, unquestioning, loyalty.
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Boars, Gore, and Swords is hosted by stand-up comedians Ivan Hernandez and Red Scott. In each episode they break down HBO's Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. They also talk about movies, TV, science fiction, fantasy, and lots of other things. NSFW.

Ivan and Red continue their delve into George R.R. Martin’s latest not-so-short story in the “A Song of Ice and Fire” world, “The Princess and The Queen,” part of the Dangerous Women Anthology. Sick Red is back as they briefly discuss House of Cards and Outlanders before moving on to Dragon Fighting, Lord Darklyn the Brooding, armor melting into flesh, id’ing bodies without dental records, the nasty implications of a sword named “Orphan Maker,” The Gold Turncloaks, and the harms of foreshadowing.

This episode is brought to you by Audible, for a free audiobook of your choice and a free 30-day trial membership, go to audiblepodcast.com/boars
Your browser does not support the audio element.

Boars, Gore, and Swords is hosted by stand-up comedians Ivan Hernandez and Red Scott. In each episode they break down HBO's Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. They also talk about movies, TV, science fiction, fantasy, and lots of other things. NSFW.

Ivan and Red dive into George R.R. Martin’s latest not so short story in the ASOIAF world, “The Princess and The Queen, or, The Blacks and The Greens”, part of the Railroad edited Dangerous Women Anthology. We discuss Demon Cores, Railroad’s ever increasing biography, the origin of Cadbury eggs, George R.R. Martin as an in-canon character, the fatality of naps, world building, Dragon representation in parliament, and one of the most psychologically disturbing murders since David Fincher’s 7even.

This episode is brought to you by Squarespace, the all-in-one platform that makes it fast and easy to create your own professional website or online portfolio. For a free trial and 10% off, go to squarespace.com use offer code GORE.
Your browser does not support the audio element.

Boars, Gore, and Swords is hosted by stand-up comedians Ivan Hernandez and Red Scott. In each episode they break down HBO's Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. They also talk about movies, TV, science fiction, fantasy, and lots of other things. NSFW.

Guy Branum of Totally Biased and Chelsea Lately competes against third chair Kelly Anneken and Ivan Hernandez to establish dominance over the knowledge of Season 3 of Game of Thrones. Red hosts and the audience cheers. This live show was recorded at the Cinecave in Lost Weekend Video and recorded by Will Scovill.

This episode is brought to you by Squarespace, the all-in-one platform that makes it fast and easy to create your own professional website or online portfolio. For a free trial and 10% off, go to squarespace.com use offer code GORE.
Your browser does not support the audio element.

Boars, Gore, and Swords is hosted by stand-up comedians Ivan Hernandez and Red Scott. In each episode they break down HBO's Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. They also talk about movies, TV, science fiction, fantasy, and lots of other things. NSFW.

Just days before our live Game of Thrones gameshow at Lost Weekend in San Francisco, Ivan and Red hit the latest in this series of recommendations for GoT fans desperate for worthy off-season entertainment, “What You Should Be Watching.” This week it’s HBO’s True Detective, AKA the Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey non-Buddy Cop non-Comedy. They cover the world’s greatest casting agent, correlations with Aaron Sorkin, Rustin Spencer and his connection to Ocean’s 11, how to share what kind of person you are, McConaughey on sizzurp, filling in plot points with pagers and hurricanes, the worst kind of atheist, the show’s problems with women, and elements of a successful pilot.
Your browser does not support the audio element.

Boars, Gore, and Swords is hosted by stand-up comedians Ivan Hernandez and Red Scott. In each episode they break down HBO's Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. They also talk about movies, TV, science fiction, fantasy, and lots of other things. NSFW.

With an episode yet between our live podcast and beginning Martin’s “The Princess and the Queen” in George R.R. Martin’s Dangerous Women anthology, Ivan and Red continue to direct Game of Thrones fans desperate for entertainment towards worthy replacements with our “What You Should Be Watching” series! This week it’s Showtime’s Masters of Sex, featuring the fascinating and truly terrifying sexual lives of the 1950s. Ivan and Red are joined by Caitlin Gill, member of the San Francisco comedy mafia “The Business”, who has appeared in 7x7 Magazine, on NPR’s Snap Judgement, and on this very podcast. Get into it, Daddy!
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Zack writes, "In 1947, Mel Blanc, the voice of Bugs Bunny, the Road Runner and other beloved cartoon characters had his own radio show spinning out of his appearances on Jack Benny's program, where he played a fix-it shop owner. More than 40 episodes are available to legally download for free on this page."

Tavie sez, "Legendary comedy troupe (and troupe of my heart), Kids in the Hall, have put together old and new material for a limited reunion engagement in Toronto this December. This may or may not lead to another North American tour, so smart people are hightailing it to Toronto to see them perform in Toronto Sketchfest December 4 - 7:"

The highlight of my podcast week is the Friday nights when the BBC Friday Night Comedy podcast includes an episode of The News Quiz (as it does this week: MP3), and the highlight of the News Quiz is always Jeremy Hardy, who makes me laugh so hard with his incredible deadpan delivery and quick wit that I'm often in danger of wetting myself.

I just bought a full seven seasons' worth of Hardy's radio show, Jeremy Hardy Speaks the Nation from AudioGo (which sells them without DRM as MP3s!), and spent a solid week in comedy heaven. If you like fast, funny, lefty comedy that acerbic, smart and unrelenting, this is just about your best entertainment buy.

Above, an episode of Robert Llewellyn's Carpool show, wherein he gives people a drive and interviews them with cameras all around his car.

The campaign to rename West 121st St in NYC for George Carlin has nearly succeeded, but is being blocked by a single vote -- and faces opposition from his boyhood Catholic church and school. A fundraiser at the Gotham Comedy Club tomorrow night will feature an all-star standup cast to raise money to support the cause. (via Reddit)

The July 27 episode of the WTF podcast has an excellent hour-and-a-half interview with Cheech and Chong. It turns out they had very interesting lives before they got together to form the incredibly successful comedy duo. Tommy Chong was the guitar player in a Motown-label rhythm and blues band, and Cheech Marin was a music journalist and Vietnam war protester. I imagine both of them are close to 70 years old now, but they sound exactly the same as I remember them on their LP records from the early 1970s. This was a delightful interview.

One of Community's most notable and popular writers, Megan Ganz, has announced in a Reddit post that she's taken a position at ABC's Modern Family. While it's sad to see her go, it's hard to blame her for leaving when there is constantly a question about Community's future. But at least we'll get to see two more episodes in Season 4 that were written by Ganz, and she'll be staying on to oversee the editing of those two episodes ("Paranormal Parentage" and the season finale, "Advanced Introduction to Finality"). Said the scribe:

We filmed the bottle episode in chronological order so this was the first line that we shot and I remember sitting at the monitors at 7am on the first day thinking, "If they call action and no one runs in here screaming 'stop the TV-equivalent of presses,' then I will have written a line that will appear on a television show. I'll be a television writer." And the director did call action–as they do–and so I was. Just like that. ...

This isn't the end of me and Greendale. Community was my world for four seasons and my job for three, and has hold of my whole heart like a bad-news high school boyfriend. I'll never really get away. The chemistry is too perfect and the writing room couches aren't really that uncomfortable to sleep on and I just can't stop writing for Britta. Plus I still have to do my editing pass on the finale. I think I left a box in my office, too. Bobrow probably misses me. Better stop by on my way home.

Ganz's voice on Community will definitely be missed, but I prefer to see her gainfully employed rather than suddenly silenced or underutilized. I will probably also really, truly have to start watching Modern Family now.

As part of its first comedy issue -- or as I like to call it, "The Sexiest Humans Alive" issue -- Vanity Fair has featured a photo shoot and (unembeddable) interview with the lads of The Lonely Island, Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer, and Jorma Taccone. They provide exactly zero information on their future plans and talk about fake cookbooks instead, and I'm okay with that. (via Vanity Fair)

(Video link) In this preview of IFC's Portlandia holiday special, Candace and Toni, the persons who run feminist bookstore Women & Women First (Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein), have been surprised with a last-minute babysitting request from Candace's son, played by Bobby Moynihan, who can no longer be bribed with free vagina pillows. Alas, another victim of the patriarchy. "Winter in Portlandia" will air Friday, December 14 at 10:30 PM EST on IFC. In addition to Moynihan, Jim Gaffigan and Matt Lucas will be stopping by! (via IFC)

What's the deal with texting? Are you being sarcastic? Are you mad at me? Are you typing this while on the toilet? I don't wanna be a meme! Did you ever stop to think about how incredibly perfect Seinfeld would be in today's social media-crazed world? Thanks to the newly formed Modern Seinfeld Twitter account, you can get a 140-character (or less) idea at what a current episode of the "Show About Nothing" would cover. And when you consider all the "nothing" we do all day and how much awkward human behavior it causes, Seinfeld could probably find enough material to last twenty years. (via Twitter)

I note that a number of news outlets are reporting about her post-treatment (?) phase as "cured," or "cancer-free," and wince at that language because the disease is never that simple, and those terms imply something that we hope for but cannot guarantee. But it sounds like her course of treatment was successful and that she is in an excellent place.

I am not glad Notaro has cancer. But I am glad people with cancer now have someone like Tig to point to all that is laughable, and all that is darkly humorous, about the experience of being a person with cancer.

From the wonderful blog "Vintage Scans," a page from Lifemanship lesson from Stephen Potter, 1957 (11th impression). Potter was a British writer known for dry, mocking, self-help books, and the TV and film projects they inspired.

I've always admired Steve Martin. He's smart, funny, and avoids engaging in the kind of behavior that ends up in celebrity tabloids. (He's also a terrific banjo player.) I recently read his autobiography, Born Standing Up, and now I admire him even more.

This short book is about Steve Martin's career as a stand-up comic, which lasted about 20 years and ended abruptly (by his decision) in the 1980s. Martin starts with his childhood, which is full of wonderful anecdotes about working in the magic trick store at Disneyland as a young teenager, and doing magic and comedy routines at Knott's Berry Farm. Martin highly praises the old vaudevillians and magicians he worked with at the theme parks. These stage show veterans took Martin under their wings and mentored him in the art of timing, patter, trick presentation, and joke delivery. Fortunately for Martin, the Orange County high school he attended didn't assign homework, so he was able to spend every waking minute outside of school at the theme parks, learning his craft. (If he had been required to do as much homework as a student does today, he may very well have ended up working alongside his dad as a real estate agent, albeit a funny one.)

Martin goes on to describe how he went on the road, spending years developing his unique style of stand-up. As he describes it, he was not doing stand-up. Instead, he played the role of a foolish comic doing stand-up. In the 1960s, he experimented with his routines in the small clubs of San Francisco's North Beach, sometimes to a completely empty room, save a bartender.

Martin's rise to fame was gradual. But that all changed in the late 1970s when his brand of quirky humor caught on in a big way (thanks in large part to his frequent appearances on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show). Martin went from filling 100 seaters to 1000-seaters. His success begat more success. In a period of months, his audience grew to arenas filled with 20,000, then 40,000, then 60,000 people. His brand of physical humor was impossible for most people in a mega-sized venue to appreciate. Martin was just a white dot on the stage.

The resulting fame, while not entirely unwelcome, was often a drag for Martin. An admittedly shy and private man, Martin said he felt uncomfortable when people on the street would excitedly recite his jokes back to him and expect him to be a wild and huh-razy guy."

Martin rode the wave for a few more years, but when he realized that he was no longer doing stand-up, but instead had become a kind of party host for giant throngs of people who wanted to hear him deliver the same stuff over and over again, he called it quits and never did another stand up show. Martin says that until he wrote this book, he rarely gave a thought to the stand-up up career that had made him famous.

I think the best way to read Born Standing Up is to listen to the audiobook, read by Steve Martin himself. That way, you get to hear the way he says his stock lines ("Excuuuuse meeee!") and you get to hear his emotions when he talks about his father (a cold-hearted man who wrote a negative review of Steve Martin's movie The Jerk first appearance on Saturday Night Live, in the company real estate newsletter he produced).

I hope Martin writes a follow-up book that covers his movie and music career, too.

[Update] commenter Petzl says:

Speaking of Martin's self-effacing manner, for years he's been (quietly) famous for handing out these cards.

They're brilliant: he doesn't have to give his personalized signature (which must get old after the first 1000 or so); he gives his fan something uniquely Steve Martin to take away, as well as giving them a "funny story"; it allows him to exit cleanly and quickly.

The un-bylined author of the Cookies for Breakfast tumblog publishes the story of two female friends attending a standup performance by Daniel Tosh, host of the notably unfunny Comedy Central show Tosh.0, in which the comedian made some stupid rape jokes. Not that there are any other kind of rape jokes.

“Actually, rape jokes are never funny!,” the woman in the published account says she replied from the audience.

I did it because, even though being “disruptive” is against my nature, I felt that sitting there and saying nothing, or leaving quietly, would have been against my values as a person and as a woman. I don’t sit there while someone tells me how I should feel about something as profound and damaging as rape.

After I called out to him, Tosh paused for a moment. Then, he says, “Wouldn’t it be funny if that girl got raped by like, 5 guys right now? Like right now? What if a bunch of guys just raped her…” and I, completely stunned and finding it hard to process what was happening but knowing i needed to get out of there, immediately nudged my friend, who was also completely stunned, and we high-tailed it out of there. It was humiliating, of course, especially as the audience guffawed in response to Tosh, their eyes following us as we made our way out of there. I didn’t hear the rest of what he said about me.

Now, proposing that an audience member sitting right in front of you in a crowd of mostly men "get raped by, like, 5 guys right now" is in my opinion a whole lot heavier than letting a few random rape jokes drop in your lame standup act. Not that rape jokes are lulzy. But, Christ, what an asshole.

By way of this non-apology, Tosh appears to confirm the woman's story: